The ScALE (1-10)

One to Ten is the scale they use in the hospital by doctors and nurses to put a level on how much pain one goes through. ONE being the least amount of pain to TEN being the most amount of pain.

Whenever I get to that point where I'm faced with having to put a number to my pain I tremble a bit because if I give a number which changes like the wind, will I be taken seriously and treated accordingly? It's amazing how pain functions and how wide of a range it covers. So its hard to put all the pain I feel into a box when its above and beyond any constrictions the One to Ten scale provides.

There are many times where I've given my pain a SIX when the nurse/doc/family member will look at me and say "No, you're definitely not at a 6. By looking at you I would at the least give it a 10." Its hard giving my pain a ranking because what I consider an 8 someone else may give it a 10. For instance, I personally have a high tolerance for pain so when I give my pain a number then that's what I'm giving the medical staff to work with and at times it can limit or affect the type of care that I receive.

When I go to the hospital it becomes a kind of a game trying to really capture how much pain I'm going through with the number I decide to give. It's also hard because my pain isn't black and white as the scale might want it to be. For example, my pain has not just been throughout my whole body but in certain sections of my body. So there are times when I go through pain in my legs, stomach and shoulders and I'm asked to rate my pain. Well in this instance I rate all three areas separately and average them out to one number which I then give the nurse.

Imagine if there was no scale and no instrument in which nurses and doctors alike could use to identify a ballpark area the type of pain we sickle cell anemia sufferers endure! It would definitely make things allot harder. Though the scale is not a perfect science it is a tool that helps identify the level of pain I go through. It's the beginning to a conversation or dialog with the medical staff as to what I'm going through and I appreciate that because its the closest thing to them knowing/understanding where I am at for that moment.


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